


Sympatico

by BloodWhitePanther



Category: Nightflyers (TV 2018)
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Assets & Handlers, Doctor/Patient, F/M, Falling In Love, Handlers, Human Experimentation, Introspection, Psychic Abilities, Psychic Bond, Soul Bond, Soulmates, Spoilers, Telepathic Bond, Telepathy, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-03-06 02:31:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18841822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BloodWhitePanther/pseuds/BloodWhitePanther
Summary: Thale doesn’t know how to exist without Agatha.





	Sympatico

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All recognizable characters, settings and concepts belong to the legal copyright holders. This is a fanwork, and I have not profited financially from its creation or distribution.

Thale doesn’t know how to exist without Agatha. She’s been his handler ever since he was a child, almost since the moment he was taken away from his family. He may not remember his biological parents — indeed, he remembers very little from the first days of the experiment, let alone the details of his life before it — but he remembers meeting Agatha.

In fact, Thale’s first fully formed memory that deserves to be remembered consists of their first close encounter. She is sweet but steely yet almost shy, hesitant in her inexperience. Her voice is like a song, and he turns to face the sound instinctively, seeking the face that accompanies her gentle mind.

He remembers looking at Agatha for the first time, losing himself even as he finds the universe behind the hazel of her eyes.

Since meeting Agatha, Thale has never needed anyone but her. Handler, mother, sister, friend — she is his everything. When the intrusive sights and sounds become too much, encroaching ever deeper in his consciousness, she is the only presence that soothes the writhing sea of sensory overload. Sometimes, she is the only presence that he can bring himself to tolerate at all.

And it isn’t just because she’s kind, empathic, beautiful. It doesn’t come down to her secret, which he keeps without a second thought. (No, no matter his anger, his frustration, his pain, Thale never tells a soul she’s an L.) The water runs deeper.

Their souls are shockingly sympatico.

Sinking into the stillness of her mind is like submerging the roiling mess of heat inside his head underneath the surface of a cool mountain lake. Just as she cools the burn of his frustration, he melts through the icy edges of her aloofness.

Thale grows into his love for Agatha as surely as he grows into his own body, and by the time he reaches adolescence, he’s long past the point of wanting anyone but her. She is the sunshine to his shadow. Or perhaps, it’s the reverse. Regardless, Agatha is Thale’s true opposite, the other side of the coin. He grows on her like lichens on a stone, imprinting himself on her consciousness in echoes that reflect back the brand on his own soul.

She does not mean to own him, but he is hers nonetheless.

Like a magnet drawn to true north, he can’t help but look inside her mind, sifting through the substance of her thoughts, fitting himself into the cracks and crevices, making himself at home inside her head.

Refraction. A house of mirrors. A kaleidoscope of memories in her head.

“That’s private,” she says when he teases her with the memory of her naked skin.

Regretfully, Thale breaks contact, dropping his eyes to the floor. He wants to respect her boundaries, artificially constructed though they may be, but he can never seem to help himself. He doesn’t know how to explain that, in her presence, the tendrils of his mind seem to forget where his own thoughts end and hers begin.


End file.
